Africa Cup of Nations 2012: International Failure Continues for Cote D'Ivoire

The fates of international football have had all too much fun fooling with the hopes and dreams of Cote d'Ivoire in recent years, a notion to which the Elephants' loss to underdog Zambia on penalty kicks in the finale of the 2012 Africa Cup of Nations only serves as further confirmation.

The war-torn west African nation has grown into a global sporting power amidst sporadic conflict, including a Second Ivorian Civil War that marred the spring of 2011. The tenuous situation at home hasn't exactly stopped Cote d'Ivoire from churning out football stars abroad, with Didier Drogba, Gervinho, Salomon Kalou and the Toure brothers among the more notable Ivorians to have found lucrative work abroad with big-money clubs over the last decade or so.

That massive leap in quality and experience around the world has reaped previously unthinkable dividends for Cote d'Ivoire, both on and off the pitch. In 2006, the Elephants finished as runners-up in the AFCON and qualified for their first-ever FIFA World Cup. In doing so, the team managed to broker a peace agreement between warring factions amidst the First Ivorian Civil War. The Ivorians failed to advance out of the group stage after suffering 2-1 defeats to Argentina and the Netherlands, though they were able to salvage a third-place finish by way of a 3-2 triumph over Serbia and Montenegro.

The Elephants struggled to build on that newfound success, notching a fourth-place finish in the 2008 AFCON and failing to qualify for the 2009 FIFA Confederations Cup.

Still, the Ivorians made it to the 2010 World Cup in South Africa, where they looked like the best bet among the African nations present to advance deep into the tournament on account of their terrific talent base.

The problem? They were trapped in a "group of death" with Brazil and Portugal, and failed to qualify as a result.

Which brings us to the present day, where the Ivorians now find themselves as the Goliaths of African football, felled by the Davidian Chipolopolo of Zambia. The Ivorians went through the AFCON without surrendering a single goal, yet couldn't quite net one of their own against the gutty underdogs. Drogba's gaffe on a penalty kick in the second half tilted momentum firmly in the Zambians favor, which, after 120 minutes of hard-fought football, they carried into an 8-7 shootout victory.

But while the Copper Bullets were busy celebrating their triumph and honoring the memory of those Zambian footballers who'd lost their lives in Gabon in 1993, the Elephants had only themselves to blame for coming up short this time around.

That's not to say that all is necessarily lost for the Ivorians. The Elephants still have plenty of world-class players sprinkled across the football landscape—all of whom are likely to coalesce again in time for a run at the 2014 World Cup in Brazil.

For now, though, as close as the Ivorians came to claiming their second AFCON title, they have only disappointment on the pitch to comfort themselves with. What they do with that disappointment—whether they use it as further motivation or wallow in devastation—may well determine how much higher the Elephants climb in the worldwide football hierarchy.

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